In the field of real estate, and in particular the new home market, there is a need to identify customers that may potentially purchase homes. Such customers—often called “leads”—typically attend an “open house” or showcase weekend with the goal of evaluating a property to determine if they want to purchase it. At a showcase weekend, real estate professionals such as sales people try to meet each customer personally and, in the process, ascertain customer data such as his or her name, contact information, price range, and property preferences.
In some instances, showcase weekends are so busy that, regardless of the sales staff's efforts, some customers visit the property but are never approached personally. In these situations, a never approached customer may become discouraged because his or her questions regarding the property are not answered. Moreover, because the promotional materials are expensive to produce (especially for upscale communities), marketing literature (e.g., brochures, pamphlets, flyers, and the like) is rarely left out for pickup. Accordingly, customers often leave a showcase weekend with little or no information regarding the property and its offerings while the sales staff fails to collect leads.
Additionally, even when a sales person has the ability to talk directly with a customer, that customer may prefer not to interface directly with the sales person. For example, the customer may be intimidated by overly aggressive salespeople; or, the customer may simply want to view the property, retrieve relevant marketing literature, and leave without investing much time.
Thus, a need exists for a device that can—without the involvement of a sales person—collect customer data, provide customers with relevant marketing literature, and disseminate the customer data to the sales staff.